


after_image

by earlylight



Series: Of Dreams and Electric Sheep [3]
Category: Mr. Robot (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Multi, Not A Fix-It, Spoilers through S04E01, vague depictions of body horror because Mr. Robot's brain is just Like That
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-14
Updated: 2019-10-14
Packaged: 2020-12-16 02:21:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21028676
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/earlylight/pseuds/earlylight
Summary: He can feel it, the moment Elliot falls asleep – the heady slide of control returning, ticking over, click of the cylinder loading a new round. In their old game of Russian roulette, he used to be the bullet. Now, with the chambers of the gun empty, he’s at a loss. This is not what he was made for.Mr. Robot has a change of heart – and not one he necessarily asked for. Set during 4x01.





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**Author's Note:**

> Am I angry? No, the writing was kinda on the wall here -- I got my anger over with before the season started. Am I disappointed and generally bitter? Yes. Do I understand the logic behind it? Also yes. Am I really, incandescently busy at the mo and basically broke my self-imposed writing ban in order to write this in brief scraps of time over the past week so I could get it out of my system? You bet. Here's hoping Tyrell doesn't die before December because, buddy, I do not have the TIME.
> 
> (ETA: This was obviously written and published before 4x03 so I'm dying at somehow predicting an entire episode's monologue throughline a la Mr Robot and Russian roulette. Get your own metaphors, Sam Esmail!! Or, at LEAST, get me a job.)

He can feel it, the moment Elliot falls asleep – the heady slide of control returning, ticking over, click of the cylinder loading a new round. In their old game of Russian roulette, he used to be the bullet. Now, with the chambers of the gun empty, he’s at a loss. This is not what he was made for.

Protonmail, unknown address, image attachment._ She did not run, nor beg for mercy. An honorable death. I hope you find comfort in that, my dear Elliot._ Elliot had looked at the picture, drank it in, silent, unmoving. And then, calmly, pressed his hand to his chest, and then _into_ his chest – wedged between two ribs, twisting to find the right angle, and then ripped out his heart, veins swinging out of the blood spray like hot spaghetti. Elliot had turned to him, like Osiris, taking the measure of his heart against a feather and finding it wanting, and so he _took_ – plunged in the other hand, working through the sinews, held his pulse in his fist and taken it for his own, setting his former heart in its place. Metaphor, maybe, but no less visceral with the viscera invisible – every kind and tender part of Elliot dumped right through his ribcage as though he were a charity bin, Elliot shedding his childish things and stealing back the rage that had made him. And, so, accordingly, Elliot smashed his phone. A lamp. And plates left in the sink, and the landline against a wall, and nearly taken down a monitor until he found himself holding Elliot back as he wrested back control, like pulling a thorn out of the foot of a wild animal, thrashing and snarling until he finally went limp.

So, back to square one – what the fuck does he do now?

The front door swinging loudly open seems to answer that question for him. “What the _fuck_, dude,” Darlene says, by way of greeting, brandishing her phone. “If this is some kind of sick joke, it’s not funny.”

_We should tell Darlene,_ he’d said, at some point after the image but before his surprise open heart transplant and the subsequent demise of the phone. Elliot had said nothing in response, but picked it up, unseeing, and shot off some message – which has apparently been very much received.

“Elliot’s not here right now,” he says, looking over to the bed – to Elliot, curled in the fetal position, hood pulled tight over red-rimmed eyes. Not that Darlene could see him, either way. At least he was able to clean up some of the mess Elliot had made before he put him down, so she wouldn’t freak the minute she came through the door. “You’ll have to talk to me. Or, I can take a message. Your call.”

“What, so _you_ sent me that shit?” she says, sourly. “Okay, yeah, that tracks. Asshole. Can you fuck off and, like, get Elliot back so I can talk to him?”

“No can do,” he replies. “Elliot’s off the clock. Look, whatever that message said, I didn’t send it. If you want to yell at Elliot through me, give me something to work with, here.”

“Fine,” Darlene says, tightly. “You want to explain what the fuck ‘Angela’s gone’ is supposed to mean?”

He looks at her, stiff and sharp-angled under a thick coat and fuck-off boots, and doesn’t feel particularly confident about how this conversation is going to go. Brittle things can break. “You should probably sit down for this.”

Darlene’s eyes widen, immediately catching the line, that universal code for _shit’s worse than bad._ “No,” she says, half-sharp, half-choked off, taking an unsteady step backwards. “No, fuck you, _no._”

“Darlene, Angela is dead,” he says, just to be clear about it. “The Dark Army got to her.” He pauses a moment, that weird chest-nausea percolating a bit more, and adds, belatedly, “Sorry.”

A beat, and then – “No,” Darlene repeats, clipped off, starting to pace. “No, Elliot just said she’s _gone_, right so—yeah, she’s going through some shit, she’s run off somewhere, that’s okay. We’ll find her.”

“Whiterose confirmed it,” he cuts in. “You can believe me, or don’t, but that’s just how it is.”

“So what, you’re just going to believe whatever lies she feeds you?” Darlene shoots back. “Wake _up_, dude, this is her game, she’s trying to control you, and you’re just sitting back and letting her mess with you like this? After everything we’ve been through, all the bullshit, we finally get a win and you just roll over? Jesus, Elliot, this is _Angela_. She needs us, so let’s fucking _go_.”

He should not be dealing with this shit. He is the _last_ person who should be pulling strings in this kind of situation. The last time he’d seen Darlene, before the barn, she’d been trying to hack Elliot and he’d blown up in her face, gone in too hot and scared the shit out of her. _You’re hurting me, stop! _This is what he does to people. The bullet, not the balm.

Except – a flicker of memory, a candle in the night: Angela, looking him right in the eye, cool and unafraid in the grip of his anger. _Then we’ll find a way to redirect his energy._

“Darlene, I’m sorry,” he says, pitching low, soft. At least, he hopes it’s coming across that way. This is very much a beta test. “I am. But you can scour all of New York and it won’t change the fact that she is dead.” He steps into her space, bracketing her arms and holding her still, gentle as he can. _Redirect her energy._ “I’m not coming with you, and neither is Elliot, but, if doing this is will help you find closure, there’s another way we can—”

“Fuck you, don’t touch me, you’re not my brother,” Darlene spits, shoving him off. “Who even_ are_ you?”

“I am Mr. Robot,” he says, slowly, testing the weight of it out on his tongue. It still doesn’t quite fit, it’s not _his,_ but no point getting fucking precious about it – a name is a tool. It serves a purpose. And right now, his purpose is square one. Go back, and start figuring it out from there.

Darlene scoffs, short and bitter. “Yeah, right. _That_ guy’s a total psycho, but at least he has some fucking balls. Whoever you are, I don’t care, I’m just _asking_ you to nut the fuck up and help me. I’m leaving either way.”

“No,” Mr. Robot replies. “You’re right, it’s not quite me. But it’s who Elliot needs me to be, right now. So, go on your wild goose chase if you have to, but once you get it out of your system, come back, because he’s gonna need you too.”

*

“Order up,” Mr. Robot says, when the door opens. Old codeword, from the Red Wheelbarrow BBQ days. The man at the threshold registers it with the bare touch of a nod, the flat, bored look on his face unmoved. Still in his day suit, dark navy paired with a lighter tie, and he smells like a distillery – but then, again, the man’s got a liver of steel, and sure doesn’t hurt for practice.

“What do you want?” Tyrell asks, shortly.

Cutting right to the chase, then. “A strong drink and a quick fuck, preferably in that order.”

Tyrell nods, again, maybe a little less bored – his eyes flicking down his body, taking him in, evidence that – but not exactly enthused. Not like the old days, on his knees, pressed eager into the cool barrel of a gun, ready to fellate it if Mr. Robot had said the word. A few bullets later, going hot and cold with your alter, really takes off the shine. “Come in, then,” he says, distantly, and strides back into the kitchen, leaving the door open.

This isn’t his first conjugal visit, and probably won’t be his last. But Tyrell’s fallen into this—this fugue state, ever since Price dropped the CTO position into his lap like a stale candy-cane from a mall Santa. Gone is the tempest, the hot dripping mercury of yesteryear – Wellick’s a neutered dog, balls in Whiterose’s purse, and he knows it, now. T.S. Eliot’s very own _Hollow Man._ As far as Mr. Robot knows, he goes to work, does his worthless corporate bullshit, then comes home and drinks. Which is one of the reasons why he’s following Tyrell from the polished foyer into the kitchen, accepting a glass of vodka, poured neat – misery loves company.

“So,” Tyrell begins, swilling the word in his mouth like the vodka in his glass, the long line of him leant against the kitchen island. “Why are you _really_ here? Not that I mind the company. My present demeanor doesn’t exactly invite a lot of house callers. Joanna was always the better entertainer – my assistant says I’m 'not approachable,’ but that it ‘adds to the mystique’,” He drains his glass easily, setting it down onto the marble. “Trying to get back into E Corp? Perhaps, if you tie me up, I’ll let you root my phone.”

“Nope, just what it says on the tin,” Mr. Robot replies, slowly pacing the room, “Strong drink, quick fuck, though the bondage sounds fun, we can certainly put a pin in that for next time.” His eyes catch on the crib, still in place in the lounge, gathering dust. Somewhat of a social _faux pas_, keeping one’s skeletons on display outside the closet – not so much an icebreaker as being pushed into a vat of liquid nitrogen. 'Not approachable' definitely fits the bill. “Surely our beloved hero is pretty hot property,” he continues, anyway. “I’m surprised I’m not wading through a sea of New York’s finest bootlicking sycophants as we speak.”

“I’m afraid I’m not much fun at soirees, these days,” Tyrell says, carelessly. “It all seems very frivolous, anyway. The parties, the ass-kissing, making nice with the people you despise to curry favor, no – not much point in climbing the ladder when you’re shackled to the top. Still,” he continues, “There’s something on your mind. There’s another reason you came here tonight. Don’t look so surprised – we’ve worked together long enough. As much as you don’t want to admit it, we’re a lot alike, you and I. The way we use our time must have purpose. So, what is yours?”

“Yeah, this all seems like a very productive use of your time,” Mr. Robot shoots back, stalling, gesturing wide at the scene they’re sharing. The jab doesn’t land – Tyrell shrugs, and pours himself another drink, as if to prove the point.

_Purpose,_ Mr. Robot thinks. _Should I tell him? __Sure, Tyrell has a right to know, we_ were_ all working together for a time, if you could call it that, but if I tell him it risks this all turning into some kind of bereavement parade. Like, what, am I meant to break the news to Angela’s dad, next? Talk about killing the messenger, I barely scraped by with Darlene – but it’s not like Elliot would plan to, and with Whiterose behind the body, all Angela will get is her face on a milk carton, a cold case until hell freezes over. Fuck, maybe that should’ve been the play with Darlene. Maybe that’s what Elliot meant to say – _Angela’s gone_ – technically the truth, but told at a slant. Maybe that would’ve been an easier hit to take. _

_Wait. Why am I even doing this? This is Elliot’s schtick, his whole invisible friend bullshit, not mine. Jesus, what the fuck is happening to me?_

Mr. Robot takes a pull from his own glass, if only to burn those thoughts out of his skull. He’s not fucking built for this. “Angela’s dead,” he says, shortly. “Courtesy of our mutual friends. Guess I thought I’d give you a heads up. You know, watch your back. Whiterose isn’t fucking around.”

Tyrell looks to him for a long moment, unreadable. “I’m sorry to hear that,” he murmurs. “I appreciate the warning, though I’d be more concerned if I were you, at this point.” He picks up his drink, swirling the liquid inside, letting it catch the light. “The clock is ticking, as they say.”

“Angela made her own choices,” Mr. Robot replies, carefully. Never know who might be listening in, these days. “Elliot and I are making ours. That’s all we can do. Make our choices – live by them, or die by them.”

Tyrell nods, finishing up his second glass, still showing no obvious signs of inebriation. The man is like a _fish_. “She loved you, you know,” he continues. “One of the few things we had in common, once.”

“She loved _Elliot_,” Mr. Robot corrects. “_Her_ Elliot. Not me.”

“Hmm.”

Mr. Robot frowns as Tyrell sets aside his empty glass, contemplative. “What?”

“Well, I know how she felt about _him_,” Tyrell says, idly, but his gaze is direct – and _curious._ “I never considered how _you_ feel about _her_.”

Mr. Robot sets his glass down hard, a sharp retort at the marble. “Alright. Drinking time is over. Come here.”

Like a good dog, Tyrell comes to heel - kisses him slow, exploratory at first, crowding him against the kitchen counter. Mr. Robot takes his bottom lip between his teeth, bites down – hard – tastes hot copper, and Tyrell makes a noise, grabs roughly at his hips and hauls him up onto the island in one movement, setting him down heavily onto the marble. Might leave a bruise, but Elliot won’t care. Mr. Robot fists at the collar of Tyrell’s shirt, one hand landing on his tie and _yanking_, trying to—to bring out that fire in him, that feral, fearless Tyrell, pressing him to this same hardwood floor, one hand pinning his arm across his collarbone, the other poised to strike—

He can’t do it. Maybe he could get Tyrell there, play his rage like an instrument, let it thrum across his body, but in this moment his chest feels weak, fluttery, the thud of his heart almost painful against it as Tyrell draws his thumb far too fucking gently across the edge of his jaw - like a lobster put to boil, exoskeleton too tight, too hot, one deft twist of a calloused hand enough to crack the shell, draw out the meat too tender and soft to survive without it. This is what Elliot has fucking done to him - the well of his own anger drained dry and replaced with something else, something of unknowable depths. No orgasm is worth this, worth his head held underwater, gasping for air.

“Nope, okay, we’re done here,” Mr. Robot manages, still short of breath even as he pushes Tyrell out of the bracket of his legs. “Changed my mind. Sorry.”

Tyrell looks at him for a moment, catching his own breath, and by god, he’s a picture – hair and tie askew, pupils blown dark and wide within those bright rings of baby blue, a thin trickle of blood adorning his bottom lip, half-parted and nakedly vulnerable. Mr. Robot half wants to say _fuck it_ and pull him back in. He’s had worse ideas. But then Tyrell’s face closes up, returning to his current resting state, his _modus operandi, _the ol’ numb-and-bored routine. “Fine. Suit yourself,” he mutters, picking up the third of Grey Goose from the counter and heading towards the stairs, letting the bottle swing idly in one hand. “Please make sure to lock the door on your way out.”

*

Unlike Elliot, Mr. Robot has never had much trouble parsing dreamspace from reality – so often the architect, it comes with the territory – and this isn’t so much a dream as a memory, sleep just the doorframe he’s stepping through from the present to the past. He lies down on the couch in Elliot’s apartment, blinks, and sits up on Tyrell’s cot, into a cool, subterranean lair that smells faintly of brisket. Figures he’d end up back here. But Mr. Robot lets himself sink into it, back into the person he had been, once, feeling almost like a stranger in his own skin. So to speak.

“You can’t go to sleep,” Angela reminds him, as-per-fucking-usual, tone clipped in-step with her heels across the stone floor. Tyrell’s locked in, absorbed in the construct he’s building, the one they’re tag-teaming, hence him idling as he waits for the baton to be passed back – sallow in the blue light of the monitor, eyes flicking back and forth, Wellick pays neither of them any mind.

“Can’t let the monster back out from under the bed, yadda yadda,” he says, waving her off. “Isn’t this what you’re here for?” He rubs at his gritty eyes, readjusting his glasses, pulling her into focus – she’s got three takeaway cups in a cardboard carrier, and is currently setting one on the desk next to Tyrell. “Coffee, great. See, there we go, problem solved.”

Angela doesn’t come to him, though – she takes a seat at the small table across the room, crossing her legs elegantly, and removes the remaining two cups from the carrier, one placed in front of her and the other by an empty chair. Always with the fucking powerplays. He’ll indulge her though, tonight, because for whatever reason he’s just not in the mood to yank on that string. This whole thing, the day-night shifts with Elliot, squirreling their project away underground so he can’t fuck them over, their body maybe snatching a couple hours of shutdown time each night, is really fucking tiring. He’s tired. He needs to start asking Angela to bring their next orders in an IV bag, set up a medium drip. He throws himself into the chair, which scrapes loudly against the polished stone, earning him a very flat look from Angela but nary a twitch from Wellick at the keys.

The coffee is really, truly disgusting. “Jesus, this is terrible,” he says, spitting out his mouthful of lukewarm dirt onto the floor. “Did you get this from the sewers? Is there a rat out there jonesing for his fix because you’ve stolen his shitwater latte?”

“It’s a new place. Can’t establish a routine, remember?” No barb can crack that marble veneer. She holds out her hand. “If you don’t want it, I’ll get rid of it.”

That he’s not getting a replacement remains unsaid, so he takes a bolder swig. The things one does for caffeine. “Ugh. I didn’t even know they could make shit this bad, these days. You know, it reminds me of – remember when we first tasted coffee? The Corner Cafe.”

“I—yeah,” Angela says, slowly, a little light coming back into those dead eyes. “Some kind of latte, it was awful. That was you?”

“Yeah. I was around for a bit.” Up until the old man died, for the most part, a buffer between Elliot and the father he was losing – a dead man walking who refused to fight, saw that long night coming and just obediently rolled belly-up. Little did he know then that his _own_ long night was soon forthcoming – but at least he fought tooth and nail against the dying of the light, until, behind a Gentleman mask one Halloween eve, he could feel the sun against his face once again.

“It was after you—after the window incident,” Angela muses, “In the new year, maybe. You had your arm in a cast. I remember.”

“You were acting out,” he reminds her. “Losing a parent was fucking up the both of you, but at least _he_ wasn’t on track to becoming a child felon. Every time you got grounded was more shit I had to deal with from him, so, as you so eloquently put it, I _redirected your energy_.”

“Mm, what was her name, it—Sarah,” Angela says, warming to the subject. “I stood behind her in line, then ordered a hot chocolate. Gave the cashier the same name, he thought it was charming, sliding my quarters over on my tip-toes. Hot chocolate and lattes, they’d foam the milk and pour it into both to save time.” She makes the mistake of taking a sip from her own coffee, and grimaces. “_Fuck,_ you’re right. This is awful.”

“Really takes you back, huh?” he continues. “The Great Coffee Heist of ’95. Easy mark, easy grift. You waited at the pickup point, ready for the swap, meanwhile I was getting two glasses of water, one for me, one for you – one in hand, one precariously balanced on the cast. Timing was key – Sarah’s order is called up, and she moves towards the counter just as I crossed her path, eyes on that cup, so careful—_BAM!”_

“Never saw it coming,” Angela murmurs, her mouth almost a smile.

“_No, no no no, oh crap_,” he says, mimicking the high, tremulous voice of a kid who knows he’s in trouble, the contents of the glass split equally across his cast and the crisp pencil skirt of this nice business lady. “_Miss, I’m so sorry, I—you gotta help me, I’m not allowed to get the cast wet, my mom’s gonna kill me—_”

“Wouldn’t have worked these days,” Angela comments. “They’re all waterproof, now, so you’d have to—"

She’s cut off by some loud Swedish curse, as Tyrell evidently has discovered the caffeine-based Trojan in his midst. “That is _vile,_” he says, disgusted, wiping a hand across his mouth. “This is how low we’ve sunk, is it? E Corp had a barista who would make espresso on-call – authentic Italian espresso, Arabica beans flown in direct from Colombia on a private jet – and now here I am, in this wretched cave, drinking this fucking swill.”

“This is what you signed up for, kid,” he says, already up and moving over to Tyrell’s station. “You’re part of the revolution now. You want to live like a rich man, you’ll get eaten like one. So, get over it. You need to keep your energy up. No mistakes, now, we’re on the clock. Tick tock.” He slides two fingers under Tyrell’s chin, lifting it, and presses the cup to his lips. Tyrell looks at him, obstinate, unyielding, putting on a little show of resistance – powerplays, this place is lousy with them, but so long as he’s ultimately the one pulling the strings – so he places a thumb at his lip, applying pressure, until his mouth parts. “Be a good boy,” he continues, softer now, but with no less steel laced through it, moving the rim of the cup to Tyrell’s lips. “Drink.”

Tyrell complies, squeezing his eyes shut like it’s paining him to do so, but he does – drinks the coffee down, throat moving with it, until the cup is empty. He kisses him for his troubles, internally wincing around the bitter taste of the coffee – draws his eyes open, just a sliver, to see how Angela’s taking it, check on the progress of the little web he’s been spinning these past few weeks.

But when he looks to the corner table, she’s gone.

*

Elliot’s already on the go when Mr. Robot resurfaces, the grey light of morning sliced thin through the blinds. He walks over to the desk, slow, to take a look at what he’s doing, just as Elliot leans over to grab the CD sliding out of the drive. _This is Angela,_ Mr. Robot thinks. _He’s deleting her. _It’s a process he’s watched Elliot do countless times – all the people he’s hacked, neatly filed in cipher – so there’s no reason for the chest-nausea he’s been nursing to return. And, yet. Elliot’s got out a thick Sharpie, writing out her name in careful letters – _Neil Young, Tonight’s The Night._ Very apropos. Mr. Robot remembers the old vinyl, gathering dust on the shelf after their father died. He remembers the note inside, a story of grief told in three lines: _I'm sorry. You don't know these people. This means nothing to you._

What would Angela’s legacy be – her story, told in three lines? A lawsuit, meant to bring justice to victims of the Washington Township plant, settled out of court. Seventy-one buildings, the blood of thousands dirtying her hand, even though it was smeared on Trenton and Mobley – what little good it did her, in the end. Not running from her fate when it caught up to her – _an honorable death._ One that Elliot draws no comfort from, as he silently places the CD in the sleeve of his album, kicking it back under the bed and returning to the keyboard. Shutting down, automating his routine – Elliot needs him_._

_We’re not friends, you and I,_ Angela had said, and she was right – he wasn’t built to be anything other than the bullet in Elliot's gun, to wield as they saw fit. He has to be Mr. Robot, now – has to find his way back to that, whatever the cost, because, in the end, Elliot is the only person that matters. And to do that, he has to delete her, too.

He places one hand on Elliot’s shoulder as he types. Elliot, eyes fixed on the screen, doesn’t react. “AllSafe is emptied out,” Mr. Robot says, into the silence between key taps. “We should use it as our base of operations.”

Elliot turns around in his chair, abruptly, and Mr. Robot’s hand slips off. “Good idea,” he replies, standing up and heading over to his backpack. “Let’s go, then. We have a lot of work to do, and our timeline is limited.” He checks on his laptop, adding in some cables, tosses in the Sharpie and a stack of post-its. “Three months until the Congo. We go through her connections, find her identity, then sweep for exploits. We find her weakness, and we bring her down.”

Mr. Robot leans against the wall, watching him. “What if she doesn’t have one?”

Elliot turns back to him, pausing his ministrations for a moment. Mr. Robot doesn’t like the way his rage looks behind Elliot’s eyes. _He_ always ran hot, firing on all cylinders and fuck the collateral damage, concentrating his fury at a target and razing it to the ground. Elliot doesn’t duck his gaze and deflect like he used to – he’s direct, focused. Cold. “She has one,” he says, eventually. “Everyone does. And when we find it, she will pay for what she’s done.”

Elliot returns to his task at hand, gathering supplies for their expedition. Moving past Elliot, Mr. Robot pinches open the blinds. Outside, instead of the morning bustle of Chinatown, through the window is a snow-covered park – their pre-decided extraction point from the story in his dream, left unfinished. He opens up the window, stepping through, his shoes crunching in the snow.

“It’s awful,” Angela complains, sitting on the swings, hair flagged out thick and golden in the wind. His own breaths puff out in huge white clouds, quickly swirling away. “Mom used to say it gets better, but I don’t see how you could ever get used to this. Maybe this is why adults are so miserable all the time. Here, you try.”

Angela offers the stolen coffee over. Mr. Robot takes it without comment, the warmth slowly lighting up the numb nerves at his fingertips. He takes a gulp, no fear, and it’s scalding and horrifically bitter. “It’s terrible,” he agrees, as he’d said then, letting the scene play out. “Tastes like death.”

“Yeah,” Angela says, looking out to the distance, past Elliot’s hunched shoulders, out to where the weak winter light struggles to break through the clouds. Maybe to a better place. “Yeah, it does.”

**Author's Note:**

> Grief: fun for the whole family! This is maybe one of the most purple things I've ever published here, but, listen -- we all have our ways of coping, and mine are metaphors. Anyway -- I love you, Angela Moss. I hope you and Shayla are making out in some bathroom in the afterlife.


End file.
